Sunday, April 21, 2013

A Day At The Players

Yesterday I headed down to Maple Leaf Gardens (It might be
known as the Mattamy Athletic Centre, but it will always be MLG) to take in the
Players’ Championship and, I have to say, I was blown away. Herewith my
thoughts on the last big event on the curling calendar:

Facility

The new arena at Maple Leaf Gardens is nothing short of
amazing. How they managed to build a rink on the third floor of a building that
didn’t have a third floor is stunning and a reason why I’m not an engineer.
What remains is the old MLG ceiling, familiar to anyone who watched a game
there – minus the banners of course.

It’s bright and open and has seating for about 2,500, a
perfect size for this type of event. There was beer for sale although there was
no real patch, just an area at the top of the rink where you could drink.

About the only downside for curling was the lack of end
seating – the vast majority of the seats are on the side.

Fans

Here’s where I was surprised, in a good way. Everyone likes
to slag Toronto for, well, for just about everything, and it’s certainly never
thought of as a curling town. Rogers went out on a limb, perhaps naively, by
holding the crown jewel of the Grand Slam at the Gardens but the crowds have
been solid. I’d say that yesterday afternoon there were about 2,000 people in
the building. Now I realize that’s not exactly Brier-like, but for a GSOC event
in April, it was pretty good. I heard Friday evening’s gathering was similar.
It bodes well for anyone wanting to have a big curling event in this city
(hello Warren Hansen?)

Curlers

The curlers I talked to loved having this event in Toronto
for a number of reasons. First off, the facility was given a big thumbs up. The
ice was good, the lighting was good, and it was within walking distance to the hotel.
There was also the cool factor of playing in such a historic building.

But the players also loved being in Toronto, where there was
so much to do outside of curling. Players went to Jays games, Leaf games, went
shopping (Not to be sexist but I heard that answer from every one of the women
I talked to), went to the theatre and were generally enjoying themselves, often
times bringing their families along.

The other thing I heard was that a great many of the teams
had sponsors with offices based in Toronto whom they were able to bring out to
games, something they don’t get to do too often.

Media

With the help of Rogers, there was a huge push of getting
players into the public eye be it on radio or TV. Glenn Howard, Kevin Martin
and Brad Jacobs were all front and centre, something that probably wouldn’t
have happened if this was in some smaller centre. It was a big bonus for the
Slam even if non-Rogers media largely ignored the event.

The Future

Next year, the Players Championship heads to Summerside, PEI,
as a sort of make-good for the debacle that was last year. After that, however,
it appears there is a push to try and make Toronto the permanent home of the
Players. With the support of the curlers and just about everyone else, look for
this to happen.

Overall

Seems like this edition of the Players Championship was a
hit on every level. Congrats, Toronto.